The connected home has emerged as an epic battleground for the consumer. Dozens of companies are vying to be the primary gateway and on-boarding point for the connected home and literally hundreds of hardware manufacturers and app developers are competing to capture our attention (and money) while we are in our connected homes. This session will dive-in to the broader connected home platform debate and discussion and the related app development and consumer engagement opportunities.

Internet of Things World 2015 is the world’s largest and most comprehensive IoT event - with over 4,000 attendees, 275+ industry thought leaders and 150+ exhibitors. With a focus on monetizing the IoT revolution through bringing together ecosystem wide attendees, stakeholders and investors, Internet of Things World is a unique opportunity to promote your IoT message right in the heartland of IoT development.

2014 was an important year for IoT with huge opportunities of this technology firmly being realized. Accenture’s late 2014 report predicts that 69% of consumers plan to buy an in-home device by 2019, reaffirming that consumer adoption of connected technology is on the rise.

In 2015, the tremendous excitement around IoT is now bearing fruit in terms of concrete products and services. Now is the time to bring together the entire ecosystem in order to assess the commercial opportunities, to highlight the key challenges hindering IoT and to assess the range of solutions available to create a sustainable future for IoT.

The 2nd annual Internet of Things World is the only independent business event dedicated to IoT. It assesses the key horizontal challenges affecting the range of vertical markets while also featuring dedicated tracks looking at industry-specific issues.

Internet of Things World is brought to you byInforma Telecoms & Media, the world’s leading provider of events in the communications market place.

10 Internet of Things Design Considerations [White Paper] - Connecting products to the Internet of Things (IoT) is essential to manufacturers looking to stay competitive within their industry. Adding IoT capabilities gives consumers more features. It also allows the manufacturer to stay connected with their customer while discovering new product use cases and applications that open them up to new revenue streams. > Download the White Paper

How the First Apple HomeKit Products Will Work - The first collection of Apple HomeKit-compatible products were quietly announced last week at the 2015 International CES in Las Vegas, and we saw everything from smart plugs and sensors to garage door openers and locks. There’s nothing too sexy about those types of appliances, but we were able to learn more about how Apple HomeKit and its vision for the smart home will work. > Read more at Mashable

My 2015 Internet of Things Wishlist - The Internet of Things (IoT) is the most hyped technology of 2014 and 2015 promises even more innovative IoT and machine-to-machine (M2M) technology will surface. Building on the growth of IoT in 2014, the IoT will see even more explosive growth and innovation in 2015. Although I have several predictions of what will happen in the IoT world this year, I have one big item on my wish list that involves cellular carriers. > Read more at Embedded Computing Design

A few members of the Grid Connect and ConnectSense teams were excited to attend CES this year. While a lot of time was spent in the booth demoing the ConnectSense Smart Outlet, we were able to stretch our legs and explore many other CES exhibits as well. Home automation was a big aspect of the show this year and we were definitely proud to be contributing to it.

Now that it's been a week since we've returned to the office and had some time to reflect, here are some takeaways we gathered from the Smart Home section of the show...

"Home automation was the belle of the ball at CES 2015. There were a lot of new and exciting products. I feel like 2015 will be the year that home automation comes into focus and goes mainstream. The winners in this market are going to be those who focus and build best in class devices that interoperate with other companies devices through standards like HomeKit, AllSeen, OIC, Thread and others. The losers in this market will be those that try to do it all themselves and build every device under the sun on their system. In the end, what is good for consumers is good for this market. Companies that keep that in mind will do well."

"Wow! As always, the CES was an amazing event. We saw companies in the home automation space introducing products to broaden their product line, while others jumped in where they hadn’t played before. There seems to be more and more devices every time I check Gizmodo or Mashable. Unfortunately, a lot of them are the same ol’ same ol’…innovation wins with me every time!

The big question is, what company will win the platform war? Are you developing your own ecosystem of devices 'on an island' of their own? Companies need to make sure the applications or the products are upgradable to future standards to take advantage of new features and capabilities. The last thing anyone wants to do is continually replace their devices or systems when new features are enabled."

"There are a lot of people and companies who want to be involved. Many devices are similar to each other so companies must separate themselves from their competition through the features and benefits of their products. They must also make sure to deliver on their promises about the capabilities of each device. Consumers are going to have to research different companies and their products to make sure they are finding the right devices for their needs and ideally, compatible with other home automation products they have now or will have in the future.

As a consumer, my biggest takeaway was that any product I buy needs to be worth the price tag. If the features and benefits are not up to par, or if it just plain doesn't work, it's not going to be in my house."

"As a first timer, the CES show is massive. The investment of the big companies like Intel, Samsung, LG are unbelievable. Our booth was in the Innovation area, which was fun to see all the different types of companies that were doing cool things. Our new Smart Outlet was well received and demoing it with Siri is a cool feature. We will be back at CES next year, in the Smart Home section of the show."

Wicked or wickedly good Internet of Things impacts home security, smart home, appliances.

Craving more hype? Then say hello to the Internet of Things (IoT). IoT will be everywhere, will do everything, will touch everyone — and generate trillions of dollars. It will be on every wrist, imprinted into bike shorts and on cans of green beans; it will reside in every home, office, factory, hospital room, school desk, and tent worldwide. The mighty IoT may one day spew out data streams of monoicosebyte proportions, all seemingly in a nanosecond. (Monoicosebytes are 9x exponential steps beyond the terabyte.)

If you’re counting, it will be the fourth industrial revolution — the ultimate tipping point. The paramount of all paradigm shifts. The most disorderly of disruptive technologies.

IDC, a global tech market intelligence firm with an awesome ability to count objects before they exist, claims the installed base of connected things will be 212 billion by the end of 2020. These IDC crystal-ballers say Internet of Things will be “a new construct in the information and communications tech world,” and they peg IoT spending at $8.9 trillion by 2020.

Predictable with any market “ready to explode,” there is even more research to prove the point.

The first collection of Apple HomeKit-compatible products were quietly announced last week at the 2015 International CES in Las Vegas, and we saw everything from smart plugs and sensors to garage door openers and locks.

There's nothing too sexy about those types of appliances, but we were able to learn more about how Apple HomeKit and its vision for the smart home will work.

3. Features

The IoT allows companies to add features to their product that were never possible before. These features have a wide range of benefits and functions including automatic software updates (over-the-air), smart home and office connectivity, reminders for maintenance, special offers, recall notices and upgrades and remote or local access and control. It is also important for designers to work with their marketing team to be sure the features desired by marketing are not limited by the hardware and networking technologies selected by the engineers.

These features extend new benefits to manufacturers as well. The features that consumers use can provide manufacturers with valuable insight to their products and applications of those products. For example, washing machine may have 20 different functions on it, but because it is connected, the manufacturer can learn which functions the consumer uses and why and then improve the washer’s product design over time. This same connected washing machine can also email or call its owner to let them know when a part is starting to fail and needs to be fixed before a problem arises. These new features also open the manufacturer to new revenue streams presented by the data collected from the smart device. A company that sells a connected washing machine can sell data on detergent use to the companies that carry those products so that they can have better information on their customer as well.

4. User Interface

Today’s consumers and business owners expect multiple ways to access and control the world around them. How are your buyers going to interface with your product? Options are numerous and range from using a smart home panel or gateway to an on-product LCD/LED display that can be paired with LEDs or push buttons. In addition, apps to monitor and control connected devices can be web-based or available for on-the-go consumers with smart phones. The type of product and its possible use-cases are important considerations when designing a product that can communicate information to its user.

Wi-Fi-enabled IoT devices may have the ability to act as a soft access point (soft AP) to allow a user to “join” its network locally with a smart phone, laptop or tablet. Soft APs make product LED/LCD displays unnecessary since the screen of the connected device will serve the same purpose.

Using a soft AP does not preclude the module from also connecting to the Internet and cloud-based services with some Wi-Fi modules. This dual-mode is very attractive because the user can access the product remotely and locally, depending on the features and use-cases for the product.

> For more information, please call Grid Connect Inc. at +1 (630) 245-1445, or email us at iot@gridconnect.com.

SAN RAMON, Calif. - Dec. 16, 2014 - The Thread Group (www.threadgroup.org) - an industry alliance chartered with guiding the widespread adoption of Thread, the new IP-based low-power wireless networking protocol designed specifically for the home, announced today that it has grown to more than 50 members since membership opened up on Oct 1st. Additionally, the Thread Group will work with UL to perform testing and certification to ensure a high-quality user experience, as well as interoperability and security across products using Thread.

NAPERVILLE, IL--(Mar 20, 2014) - Grid Connect (www.gridconnect.com), a distributor and manufacturer of networking technology, has been named the exclusive North American distributor of High-Flying products, a line of low power Wi-Fi modules that enable devices to connect to the Internet.

High-Flying Electronics Technology Corporation (www.hi-flying.com), based in China, is a leader in Internet of Things enabling solutions. High-Flying products are used in industrial, smart metering, smart home, government, consumer and education markets.

As the North American distributor, Grid Connect provides High-Flying customers in the United States, Canada and Mexico technical support, customized product engineering and North American inventory, eliminating the time, expense and resources needed for importing, customs and duties.

North American technical support is provided by Grid Connect's engineers, who are knowledgeable about wired and wireless technology and are trained by High-Flying to customize the software to customers' exact requirements. Technical support is available by phone, email and on-line chat.

"The High-Flying product line compliments Grid Connect's network technology products and services, and utilizes our experience in developing Cloud applications that solve problems," said Mike Justice, president of Grid Connect.

While Grid Connect carries an inventory of all High-Flying products, first time customers can order small quantities or evaluation kits. Additional information and online ordering is available at www.gridconnect.com.

About Grid Connect Inc. Grid Connect, an ISO 9001:2008 company, is a leading manufacturer and distributor of products that enable the Internet of Things. The company's custom engineering services and attentive customer support ensure that all networking technology products sold by Grid Connect work to customer specifications. In stock items usually ship the same day, and all products come with a no-risk, 30-day money back guarantee. Online ordering is available at www.gridconnect.com. Grid Connect also can be found on Twitter @GridConnect and on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/company/grid-connect.

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